


But I Kiss You Like A Lover

by ktfics



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Getting Together, M/M, Post-New Dangan Ronpa V3, Pre-Game Personalities (New Dangan Ronpa V3), Virtual Reality, vr au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 19:14:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19257478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ktfics/pseuds/ktfics
Summary: The story of how Momota Kaito, Saihara Shuichi, and Ouma Kokichi fell in love two times over.





	But I Kiss You Like A Lover

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on tumblr @dykeenvy to talk oumota and saioumota! The title of this fic comes from the song No Better by Lorde.

Saihara Shuichi is Kaito’s first kiss.

The chapter three finale of the 52nd season of Danganronpa had just finished airing an hour ago, and reruns of past episodes play at a low volume from Shuichi’s shitty TV as he theorizes.

Kaito is only half-listening; the episode had been interesting enough, but he likes to save the analysis shit for Saihara and Ouma. Instead, he focuses on watching Shuichi gesture as he speaks, his hands enthusiastically emphasizing his sentences even as he nervously eyes the ground.

There’s something beautiful about him when he gets like this, this intense focus.

It’s one of the reasons Kaito had kept coming back to the boy’s side, even after he had chased away those bullies of his for good. Shuichi was far from the first person he’d saved from being harrassed, but he was the first person to shyly promise to pay Kaito back by recommending him a good book to read afterwards.

Shuichi brings a hand up to remove his cap and wipe off some of the sweat collecting on his brow before smoothing back his hair and affixing the hat back in place, not once pausing in his speech as he does so. Kaito kinda wishes he’d wear the cap less often; he understands the other boy has trouble with eye contact and doesn’t want to push him, but Kaito thinks it’s a real shame considering how pretty his eyes are.

Shuichi turns away from Kaito to point out some hint he had noticed in the episode to Kokichi, tugging on his sleeve as he does so. His fingers are delicate and just a bit shaky, like he’s so excited he can’t possibly express it entirely through words or broad gestures.

Last week, Ouma had insisted on painting everyone’s nails as the three of them sat together on Kaito’s roof and tried to escape the sweltering heat of summer. Now, Kaito gazes at the already-chipped black polish on each of Shuichi’s nails and the evidence of his terrible habit of biting them that he and Ouma have been trying to break forever. The leftover color on Shuichi’s left thumb could almost resemble a heart, if Kaito tilts his head just right.

Shuichi glances back to Kaito as he continues. “… And, I also thought, it was kinda romantic, the way he had confessed to her right before he died, don’t you think?” Kaito tries to remember exactly what had happened at the end of the episode; truth be told, he had been a bit preoccupied with watching Shuichi’s reaction instead of paying attention to the plot.

He couldn’t help it; it was one of the few times Shuichi kept his hat off for longer than a few seconds, clutching at it excitedly as he watched his previous theories come to fruition. His hair framed his face so nicely when it was loose like that, and it was especially cute when Shuichi tucked it behind his ears to better see the TV.

“Really, you think so?” Kokichi chimes in, and gives Kaito a pointed stare before continuing. “I think it’s more romantic when the characters confess before they die. That way, they get more time together, you know?”

“Yeah,” Kaito finally contributes, his voice just a tad too loud. Shuichi startles a little bit, eyes flicking up to scan Kaito’s expression for a moment. Kaito isn’t looking at him right now, though; his gaze is trained on the three piles of paperwork sitting on Shuichi’s desk, identical except for the signatures scrawled out on each page. “Yeah, you’re right, ‘Kichi.”

Kaito would never consider himself the sharpest tool in the shed, but he also knows for a fact that they’re running out of time. This summer will end, differently than every summer before it has, and this bubble that the three of them have been containing themselves in will pop; gone will be the hushed conversations held huddled together on Kokichi’s ratty futon, gone will be the nights spent fixated on the TV screen in the dimness of Shuichi’s small room as they sat closer together than necessary, gone will be the sunsets watched from Kaito’s roof and the constellations they’d made up together.

Come the end of this summer, they themselves will be gone in every way that matters, buried underneath false memories and new personalities. Kaito wonders if they’ll hate each other. Kaito wonders if they’ll kill each other. He knows that he needs that prize money more than anything but he also, quite desperately, wants to fossilize all three of them as they are now, mummified by both the summer heat and their unspoken intimacy.

Kaito doesn’t like thinking that deep about shit though; it’s not like him to get all poetic. They’ve already auditioned, already been selected, and like hell is he gonna let Kokichi and Shuichi go into a killing game without him, even if they do end up being the death of each other.

So instead, he swipes a thumb over his own bloodied knuckles self-consciously before leaning forward and cupping Shuichi’s face.

“Wha- Kaito-kun?” Kaito pauses for just a second; it’s now or never. He squeezes his eyes shut tight and presses his lips against Shuichi’s.

The other boy’s lips are chapped and the brim of his cap knocks against Kaito’s forehead unpleasantly. The sensation still sets off fireworks in Kaito’s stomach; the feeling of Shuichi slowly relaxing in his grasp and shakily settling a hand on his shoulder only increases the sweetness of the moment.

Kaito leans back and smiles, grinning wide like an idiot. Shuichi brings a hand up to his mouth, a blush rapidly spreading across his cheeks as he stares at Kaito with wide eyes.

In the background, Kaito sees Kokichi give him a thumbs-up, before he lunges across the bed towards Kaito and knocks him backwards, kissing him, hard, energetic where Shuichi was tentative but still so, so good. The smile does not leave Kaito’s face for the rest of the night, as they all curl around each other and attempt to fall asleep together on Shuichi’s twin size mattress.

Ouma Kokichi is Kaito’s first kiss.

The boy is weak in his arms, eyes still somehow frighteningly lucid even as his body shakes and shivers and tries to expel the poison that has settled in his veins.

“Hey… At least I wasn’t boring, right?” Kaito is breathless, due to both his own illness and the inescapable sensation of tragedy filling every inch of the hangar.

“No. No, of course you weren’t boring.” Kaito doesn’t know what else to say, if he should admit to the boy that he’s one of the most interesting people he’s ever met, if he should tell him that the only time he ever truly forgot about this shitty situation they’ve been placed in was when he was chasing him around like an idiot.

“Hey, Momota-chan? Do me one last favor?” Kaito nods, afraid to hear what his voice will sound like if he speaks right now.

One of Kokichi’s small hands reaches up to grip onto Kaito’s collar, and the boy yanks him down with a surprising strength.

The kiss is good. The kiss is metallic and bittersweet and terribly messy, and it’s good. There’s a certain sort of familiarity to the other boy, in the way he fits just right in Kaito’s arms, in the way that he knows exactly how to tilt his head so that their noses don’t bump. Kaito wonders what it would have been like if they’d gotten to do this more than once. Kaito wonders what it’d be like to share a lifetime with the other boy without the scent of blood clinging to their skin.

He supposes it’s probably best that even his imagination won’t let him think too deeply about that scenario; he doesn’t think he’d be able to handle it right now.

When Kaito finally places Kokichi down on the press, he tries once more to look at the boy and see him as nothing more than an enemy. He tries to conjure up that same hatred that Kokichi had inspired in him so many times before.

“Thank you, Momota-chan.” Without any cameras left to witness him, Kaito finally allows himself to let out a sob. “Can you tell Saihara-chan… Well, nevermind. Even if he doesn’t figure out that I believed in him, I’m sure you’ll do enough of that for the both of us, right, Momota-chan? No need to ruin my image right before my death is revealed.”

Kaito somehow manages to bark out a laugh even through the tears welling up in his eyes. “Of course. Shuichi’ll see right through us; I’m sure he’ll do his best to help us out.”

Kokichi gives Kaito one last smile. “See you on the other side, hero. Put on a show for me out there, won’t you?”

Kaito nods, and leans down to place a kiss on Kokichi’s cheek.

He just hopes, desperately, stupidly, that the pressure of his lips on the other boy will somehow outweigh the pressure of the hydraulic press.

Momota Kaito is supposed to be dead.

In his first lifetime, he grew up too poor and too angry for anyone to give too much of a shit about his well-being; if he got into fights and ruined all his chances for a future and died young, well then, that was his own fault.

In his second lifetime, he was too untouchable for anyone to realize he needed to be saved; his hero’s grin was blinding enough to distract from his pain all the way up until his illness had finished destroying him, and if he got into stupid fights and burned himself out before he was able to grow old, well then, that was his own fault.

Momota Kaito should be dead, and Shuichi and Kokichi are both endlessly glad that the other boy is much too stubborn for that.

“You’re an idiot, you know that, right?” Kokichi leans up on his tippy-toes to brush another kiss against Kaito’s jawline.

“What the fuck did you just call me-” Shuichi gently grips Kaito’s chin and presses a kiss to his mouth before he can continue arguing.

“Both of you, quiet.” Shuichi’s fingers are still a little shaky, but his eyes are focused and his actions are determined. Conversely, Kokichi’s hands are just as energetic, but everything about him is more precise, more deliberate.

“Aww, Saihara-chan is no fun!” Shuichi leans back and gives Kokichi a patient look that is just bordering on exasperated, before Kokichi takes advantage of his separation from Kaito to latch onto the other boy and kiss him soundly.

Kaito just watches, pleased with this turn of events. They’re both beautiful, and Kaito can’t stop thinking about their own little apartment that’s waiting for them when they get out of here. He made sure their new place would have access to the roof when they were trying to decide on where to live; he’s even already bought a telescope so they can properly take a look at all those constellations they’d named together.

As they had each signed the lease for their new apartment, their signatures familiar and yet still noticeably different, Kaito had finally known that the past was slipping away into a new summer, a new future, free of any bloodstains and full of possibility.

“Ouma-kun, we really need to finish packing.” Kokichi just sticks his tongue out at Shuichi and throws the nearest article of clothing haphazardly into their suitcase.

Kaito is positive that this time, they’ll get things right.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading, comments are appreciated!


End file.
